Artwork by Chinese Olympians Gao Min and Ye Qiaobo featured at Beijing venues as part of IOC’s Agora programme linking sports and culture
- The Chinese pair are among seven Summer and Winter Games athletes who are showcasing their art during the Beijing Olympics
- Gold medallist diver Gao has painted five fish to represent five continents while speed skater Ye is inspired by the diversity of bamboo
For China’s Gao Min, fish is symbolic of her life as a gold medal-winning Olympic diver. Five fish represent the five continents sending athletes to the Beijing Winter Olympics. A painting of five fish is Gao’s way of welcoming the world to Beijing through art.
Speed skater Ye Qiaobo believes bamboo signifies the very basis of life. It is the first stroke of a brush in a Chinese painting and it represents progress. She hopes her bamboo paintings can inspire athletes to go farther at the Beijing Games.
Gao and Ye are among seven former Olympic athletes whose artwork will be featured at the Beijing Games as part of the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) Agora programme, aimed at connecting sports with culture.
The Chinese pair join fellow Summer and Winter Games athletes Christopher Coleman (US, Bobsleigh 1992, 1994), Neil Eckersley (Great Britain, judo, 1984, 1988), Kader Klouchi (Algeria, long jump, 1992), Cameron Myler (US, luge, 1988, 1992, 1994) and Laurenne Ross (US, skiing, 2014, 2018) in displaying their artworks virtually at venues around the Beijing Olympics zones.
“I think diving itself is art, an art in the air, an art of the body challenging its limits. Today I write and paint, which is also art, an art of using actions to reflect my thinking,” Gao, who won 3m springboard gold in Seoul 1988 and Barcelona 1992, said.
